The Star Child
by Jessa L'Rynn
Summary: The Doctor and Rose are given a command on the planet Rakku. Along with the command comes a bundle of heartache for the Doctor and, as time goes on, for Rose, too. Response to AFantasticRose's challenge for July II. No Spoilers.
1. Chapter 1

This story was requested by **AFantasticRose **for the July II Challenge. It's slightly AU. Takes place after PotW, but the Doctor didn't regenerate. Rose knows about regeneration, not that it matters to this story. Oh, and they know where Jack is and visit him from time to time, so I've sorta messed up Torchwood, too, but hey, I own Doctor Who (that ALSO is in an alternate universe).

I was requested to make this 9/Rose, include a little girl from a war torn planet that they are to care for, and to have to face Jackie while dealing with said child.

It's sorta been done, so I decided to add a tiny bit of a twist.

This is two chapters long.

* * *

**The Star Child**

_Part 1:_

"I'm sorry Rose," the Doctor shouted. "There's nothing else we can do."

"It's all right!" she answered loudly. "At least we've done what we could."

He snorted and bit back a couple of swear words. "Through here," he said, more quietly now.

They were running for their lives across the plains of Rakku. Civil war had broken out between two separate religious sects over something even the Doctor couldn't fathom, and he had been trying to make peace with them, trying desperately, right up until his time sense told him to stop, that everything that happened now had to happen.

The TARDIS was just ahead. The Doctor guided Rose carefully around the smashed brick wall and through the littered corridors of what had once been the main temple of one of the two warring sects. It was time to leave. Thirty years from now, this planet would be at peace again, united by a leader who was also a pacifist according to the Doctor's memory, but until then, this was their fate.

They had just reached the inner sanctum, what was left of it, when he saw a party of four heavily cloaked people approaching. "Wait," one of them pleaded. "Please help us."

"I'm sorry," he answered, shoving Rose carefully behind him. "I've done what I could. You'll have to do the rest yourselves." He realized then that there was something truly odd about this party. There were two members of each sect in the party. It was decidedly off.

"You can do this last thing," said another. And she held out, in trembling arms, a small bundle.

The Doctor stepped forward hesitantly. "What..."

"Save the Star Child," the four commanded, and the one dropped the bundle into his startled arms. Utterly baffled now, he pushed the blanket back. Rose stepped up and stared over his arm.

"That's..."

"A baby," he agreed. "We can't take care of..." He looked up, but the room was empty except for him, Rose, and the TARDIS. "...a baby."

Slightly telepathic, like all Rakku, the child's thoughts of fear and confusion greeted his mind the moment he touched the little face. Instinct, blind, mortal, long-forgotten instinct had him answering the frightened thoughts with the idea of warmth and safety and comfort.

"Right," he said, completely startled at himself. "Let's go." He moved to set the baby down. The infant would be much more likely to survive in a war zone than the way his life went. He couldn't do it, he couldn't take a child with them.

"Here," Rose said. "Give her to me and you can unlock the door."

"Her?" he asked, and passed her right into Rose's arms as if it were the most natural thing in the world. "Support her head," he added.

"Well, I figured a girl. The blanket's pink."

"Oh," he said, and unlocked the door.

Rose went inside, carrying the little bundle. "Good job she doesn't talk yet," Rose observed.

The Doctor grinned and shucked his leather jacket, then took the baby from Rose. "Yes, it is bigger on the inside," he said. Rose shot him a look. "What?"

"You just..." She grinned. "You're so cute."

"Ya sound like Jack," he answered.

"I don't. I sound like..." She swayed sharply.

The Doctor looked at her more closely. "Rose, why didn't you tell me you were bleeding?" he demanded.

"Am I?" she asked softly. She put a hand to the back of her head, pulled it around to look at it. "Huh, whadyaknow. I am."

Baby in one arm, Rose collapsing on the other, and the Doctor just stood there and didn't know exactly what to do.

The TARDIS helped out by manifesting a small cot right in front of him. He lowered the baby into it, then lifted Rose into his arms. He carried her through to the Med bay, stopping by the console to send the TARDIS into the relative safety of a hover in the Vortex.

And just like that, there was a baby traveling on the TARDIS.

* * *

Rose came to with the most unusual sound she had ever heard in her whole life tickling at her ears. She knew that voice, thought for sure she would be able to hear it even if she were stone deaf to every other sound in the Universe. It was the Doctor, her Doctor, and he was singing.

Well, she'd heard him sing before, but not like this. It sounded like he was singing along with the TARDIS, the ringing, chiming chords of his own musical language cascading from his lips. His voice was a smooth, rich, baritone throb, and the alien syllables sifted his accent into something scarcely distinguishable.

The Doctor sang in the shower, always, but it was usually some pop tune or some strange aria. He swore when he couldn't hit the high notes and complained that he was used to being a tenor. He wryly admitted the first time she'd ever heard it that it was one of very few things he had done for as long as he could remember.

So why was it Gallifreyan, this time?

She sat up, and her head swam and the room sparkled. The sound cut off abruptly. "Lie back down, Rose," he commanded. "C'mon, now, you'll only hurt yourself."

"Wha' happened? And what were you singing?" He helped her, his large hands gentle as he lowered her, placing an extra pillow behind her so she could sit up without any effort.

"A lullaby for our unexpected guest."

She struggled with that. "There was a war."

"Right."

"And someone gave you a baby," she added. It didn't make sense. She thought she remembered him talking oh so adorably to the child, but that was definitely not him. "I dreamed that, didn't I?"

In answer, he took a few steps away, coming back with something small and decidedly pink. He laid the little bundle in her arms gently and grinned at her. "Fantastic," he pronounced softly.

Rose looked down at the squirming little person in her arms and couldn't help the idiotic grin that blossomed on her face.

* * *

"Hello, I'm the Doctor. This is my friend Rose, and the baby's a friend of ours, too."

The aliens didn't look even slightly impressed.

"Run?" Rose asked, clutching the little girl to her shoulder.

"Yeah, think so," he agreed.

* * *

"Hello, I'm the Doctor, and this is Rose."

"And the offspring?" the aliens asked, staring curiously at the child.

"Oh, she's not ours," the Doctor said.

"Kidnappers!"

"Run," ordered Rose.

* * *

The first few days with the baby on board passed comfortably, except for the two misadventures with people getting mixed up about what two people and a baby were supposed to be.

"Why can't we all be friends?" the Doctor asked. The baby, who was about the equivalent of a six month old human, was sleeping on his chest. Rose was staring at them in undisguised fascination. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing," she said. She sighed to herself. Honestly, she didn't even like kids, so why...

* * *

"Hello, I'm the Doctor."

"And your wife is?"

"She's not my wife."

After rescuing Rose from being nearly burnt at the stake, the Doctor decided that he'd had enough attempts at exploring for the next few days.

"I am so killing your daddy when we get home," Rose told the baby in a gentle, sweet tone.

He couldn't quite make himself answer that statement the way he should.

* * *

Telepathic alien baby, Rose reminded herself firmly as she lowered the child into the warm bath water of the small tub the TARDIS had provided for this purpose. If the Doctor was completely taken with the little girl, it was nothing on what the TARDIS seemed to think.

The baby now had a vast nursery between the Doctor's and Rose's rooms, full of more stuff than four kids her size could possibly need. The Doctor had tried - he really, really had - to say that it was a bad idea. They couldn't get attached to the little girl, had to find a proper place and give her into a loving home. That was why he refused to let Rose name her and wouldn't do it himself, either. Nevertheless, Rose could tell quite clearly that it would break his hearts when they found a place for her.

Rose was human and was coping with the child in the human manner, becoming quite motherly and attached, but she had nothing on the Doctor. Whenever the baby was in the same room with him, he treated her like another appendage, carrying her everywhere, talking to her, singing to her, telling her stories. Rose had realized, watching them fall asleep together in front of the telly last night, that the Doctor had had children before and they were gone.

He tried to pretend to be aloof when he thought Rose was watching him. Like just now, he'd asked her to bathe the baby and put her down for a nap, but she knew he'd turn up before too much longer on some pretext like asking her if she remembered to use the right shampoo on the baby's soft golden wispy hair. As if she could get it wrong. She'd had to ask for her own shampoo back this morning when she went to get a shower.

She gently shoved away the feeling of abject terror - it wasn't her feeling, after all, it was the baby's, and no baby liked being bathed until it was actually in the water. Rose thought instead, like the Doctor had taught her, about the nice feeling of being clean, and the wonderful warmth of sinking into a hot, soapy bath after a long day. The baby stilled and let Rose ease her into the water. Rose grinned a little when the baby let out a tiny giggle. She was getting the hang of this.

They all were.

* * *

The Doctor arrived in the bathroom at a dead run, due to the sounds of shrieking and baby squealing coming from inside. He pulled up short in the doorway, though, and very nearly fell over.

"Thought I sent you ta wash her, not the other way round," he said, unable to stifle the laughter completely. It bubbled up as a deep chuckle and the baby squealed again and held up her arms to be rescued. "Oh, no," he said to her. "You've got yourself into that predicament."

Rose sighed and dripped at him. "She decided I should have a bath, too, I guess."

He snagged a couple of towels from the cupboard. "C'mon, Star Child, let's get you dry so Rose can get dry, too."

"No, s'alright, Doctor... Star Child?" She took the towel from him, lifted the wiggly, slippery Star Child from the water, and wrapped her in it tightly. Then she passed him the baby, pulled her completely drenched tee off over her head, and grabbed the second towel. She draped it over her shoulders, took the baby back, and walked back into the nursery with her.

"They called her the Star Child, the people who handed her over."

"Good, then I can call her Starr," she said and laid the baby on the changing table.

"Yeah, could do," the Doctor agreed. He paced the nursery, looking like a caged leopard, while Rose diapered and powdered Starr. Then, he turned back up with a little onesie to dress her in and Rose obliged quietly, all the while feeling those blue eyes locked on her with an intense heat that had physical weight.

"What is it?" she whispered, as she lowered the yawning Starr into her bed.

"Your... your shorts are soaked, too," he said.

"A bit," she agreed, and rubbed the baby's back in soothing circles until she slept.

"Telepathic alien baby," he reminded her when she beamed with pride at this accomplishment.

"Shut it," she said.

"Nope," he answered, and came closer. "Can talk for the world, me." He snagged the ends of her towel and drew her closer. "That was a very cruel thing to do to an old man," he added.

She giggled. "Don't know any old men," she said, wrapping her arms around his neck. "Just you."

He grinned then and led her through the adjoining door to her room.

* * *

"Hello, I'm the Doctor. This is Rose, and Starr."

"We keep your family if you do not give us your power," said the aliens.

"Yeah, not happening," said Rose, noticing the devastated, infuriated look on the Doctor's face. "Run?" she asked.

"Yes, run," he agreed. But he didn't seem to have it in him to do it with as much energy as usual.

* * *

"We can't keep her," the Doctor said for probably the eight thousandth time. He was sitting in the rocking chair in the nursery, holding Starr who was getting bigger every day, and had just been singing to her when Rose walked in.

"That's true," Rose agreed.

But neither of them moved to do a thing about it.

* * *

Starr filled a need for him that Rose, whether as his friend, his companion, or his lover, couldn't quite do. She wasn't the kind of telepathic that Starr was and she was pretty sure she couldn't touch his mind like the child did.

So it was a complete surprise to her one morning when she answered a call from his room, to find out that he was asleep and had actually called her, silently, from inside his dreams.

* * *

"Hello, I'm the Doctor. This is my wife, Rose, and Starr, our daughter."

"Aren't you just precious?" cooed the alien at Starr.

"I can't believe that worked," the Doctor whispered in her ear.

"I didn't know I was your wife," she whispered back.

The look he answered that with made her wonder. She should have been thinking that they were just playing a role, or that he was losing it in his attempts not to let on how determined he was to keep the baby. Instead, she was sort of wondering when the ceremony had happened and how she'd missed it.


	2. Chapter 2

**As I am a professional writer and have work to do to get paid, I have decided to deal with these thudding plot bunnies in the traditional manner - I will inflict them on others. Please see my Profile for the Challenges of the Month. Brand new August challenges have been added for your entertainment, education, and inspiration. If you'd rather do July's, instead, I'm accepting July II Challenges until the end of August or until I can't keep up, whichever. Thanks to all those who have participated thus far - I've REALLY enjoyed all the results. The new challenges will run through the end of August. Please let me know when you respond to a Challenge so I can read and review.**

This story was requested by **AFantasticRose**. It's slightly AU. Takes place after PotW, but the Doctor didn't regenerate. Rose knows about regeneration, not that it matters to this story. Oh, and they know where Jack is and visit him from time to time, so I've sorta messed up Torchwood, too, but hey, I own Doctor Who (that ALSO is in an alternate universe).

I was requested to make this 9/Rose, include a little girl from a war torn planet that they are to care for, and to have to face Jackie while dealing with said child.

It's sorta been done, so I decided to add a tiny bit of a twist.

This is two chapters long.

* * *

**The Star Child**

_Chapter 2:_

Jack phoned them to let them know he had a weekend free, so they decided to pop by for a visit. "Call Jackie and Mickey the Idiot," the Doctor suggested. "Let them know we'll be in Cardiff if they want to see you."

"All right," Rose agreed cheerfully. She placed the call and didn't think, she really didn't.

When they arrived in Cardiff, the Doctor insisted that he would carry the baby. Rose teased him that he just didn't want to be caught, dead or alive, carrying the changing bag or anything like that. He shook his head and repacked everything into a dark rucksack he'd found somewhere. "More efficient, anyway. Can't understand how anyone can find anything in one of those frilly, fluffy things you've been lugging around."

"We're taking this from now on," Rose agreed, especially because this bag was connected to the TARDIS, which meant they didn't have to take Starr's bottles with them. "Still, Jack's gonna laugh at you."

"Jack's the reason I'm carrying the baby," he said.

"She's a little young for him to flirt with," Rose answered.

"I know, but try telling him that."

"You're just worried he'll hit on you. The baby might make it worse. Some men like that."

The Doctor, still managing to look every inch the Oncoming Storm with an eight month old child on his shoulder, turned to her and said, firmly, "He's not allowed to hit on you, me, or the baby."

As an after thought, on the way out the door, he added, "Neither is Mickey."

* * *

Jack didn't try to flirt with Starr too much, but she adored him instantly, anyway. He insisted on being allowed to carry her, and Rose was sure she saw pain in his bright green eyes when he held her and kissed her pale pink forehead. The four of them made their way over to meet the train that was bringing Jackie and Mickey over from London.

Starr was pointing at everything she saw and making up some noise to go with it. The Doctor said that was part of her education. Rose said it was precious, and no one could argue with that. Jack handed Starr into Rose's arms and turned to help Jackie from the train, while the Doctor grabbed a paper from the news agent and made his way back through the crowds.

Jackie stared at Starr in undisguised, unadulterated shock. "Oh my GOD!" she exclaimed. Jack caught her arm to hold her steady, and Mickey stepped around to catch her other arm. "Oh my god," she whispered. "Mickey, you were right, oh my god."

"I told you," Mickey said with a sigh.

"Um..." began Rose, completely baffled. "Yeah, can I get that again in English?"

Jackie shook her head. "Let me see her."

Rose shrugged and nodded and passed Starr over. She gestured Jack to keep a tight hold on her mum, though, because the woman still looked like she might faint any second.

"Rose," she said, looking devastated, "I'm your mother. Why didn't you tell me?"

"Tell you what?" Rose asked, still completely confused.

"What's she called?" Mickey asked. "Is it... I mean, can we pronounce it?"

"Her name's Starr," Rose answered, and reached over to soothe the golden hair that had gotten wispy and flyaway in the Cardiff weather.

"She looks just like you," Jackie said. Then, she shook her head. "She looks like you, not him, oh thank god."

_Oh_, thought Rose, finally cottoning on. She started to say something to correct the misapprehension when the Doctor turned up and grinned down at her. "She does a bit, you know," he said. "I hadn't thought about it before."

"I distinctly remember you saying you weren't shagging my daughter," Jackie snapped quietly.

The Doctor looked baffled, but shrugged. "Well, that's not the sort of thing that gets bandied about in public where I'm from."

Jack laughed, a genuinely happy laugh that bubbled up from his chest and made Starr giggle in Jackie's arms. Jackie raised the baby to her shoulder, and soothed her back, but didn't move to pass her off to anyone else.

"Alien menace," Jackie growled at the Doctor.

"Now, Jackie," chided the Doctor gently, "don't you want to take this some place private if you're going to yell at me?"

"I'll do more than yell at you," she said. "I oughtta murder you. You lied to me!"

"There's no way I'd've told you the truth. You hit too hard, even when I lie. Mind, I wasn't lying at the time..."

"I vote we head back to the TARDIS," Jack said. "This conversation's getting a bit too personal and Mickey looks like he might be sick. Rose, are you all right?"

Rose had been trying very, very hard not to laugh at the Doctor's flippant, arrogant responses to Jackie's ranting. But she was also confused. Any time she and the Doctor had had the slightest disagreement, Starr was utterly inconsolable until they both calmed down. "Is something wrong with her?" she asked the Doctor softly.

"What?" He took the baby, despite Jackie's protests, and looked at her carefully while Jack led the others on ahead. "No, she's fine. Why?"

"Well, you know, telepathic alien baby."

"Oh, that," he said. "Nah, just your mum isn't as pissed off as she's trying to let on. How'd she figure it out anyway?"

"She thinks Starr is ours."

"Ohhh," he realized. He chuckled then and handed the baby over to Rose. "What'd you tell her?"

"I hadn't realized, and then you came over and started picking on her."

This time, he laughed out loud.

* * *

The Doctor made Jack pick out a restaurant instead and he chose something far enough away from the train that Mickey had time to calm down and Jackie had time to smack the back of the Doctor's head. Still, she waited until after he'd given the baby back to Jack.

"Can I hold her?" Mickey asked as they walked.

The Doctor hesitated. "Yeah, go ahead," Rose said, but the Doctor stopped Jack and looked at Mickey very carefully.

"Yes," he said after a moment. "But make sure you think happy thoughts, yeah?"

"Sure," said Mickey, looking a bit confused and dubious.

Jackie tutted disapprovingly. The Doctor shook his head and actually apologized. "It was custom with the weight of law on my planet; only immediate family get to hold the kids. Sorry, Mickey. But, she's telepathic, so I'm not sure if that wouldn't be better for her as well. Still, you're doing fine."

Indeed, Starr seemed absolutely fascinated with him, kept tugging at his shirt and squealing with giddy infant laughter every time he looked down at her.

Jack was looking startled and thoughtful. Rose reached over and put a hand on his shoulder. "What is it?" she asked softly.

"He just handed her to me," Jack said softly. "Didn't even stop to let me ask her name. And he flinches every time I touch him, I thought... But..."

Rose smiled. "Feeling better then?" she asked.

Jack grinned and drew her into a one-armed hug.

"Hands off the blonde," the Doctor said calmly.

Jack snatched Rose up, laughing, and charged off with her. The Doctor laughed and thundered after him.

"They're mad," Jackie explained to Mickey.

"Yeah," he agreed. "Mummy and Daddy and Auntie Jack are completely nutters," he told Starr in a baby voice.

She squealed happily and, it looked like, nodded agreement.

* * *

"She's not ours," the Doctor confessed over dinner. "I mean, we've sort of adopted her, but she was given to us. We can't keep her."

Rose's heart broke for him, just seeing the devastated expression he was trying so very hard to hide. He had mashed some vegetables from his plate into an absolute puree and was trying to feed the mess to Starr. She apparently didn't find it any more appetizing than he did, but he was making an heroic effort.

Mickey and Jack talked, and Rose talked some, but mostly she was watching her mother gawk at the Doctor in undisguised fascination. Rose reached into the bag she was carrying, concentrating on Starr's lunch, and brought her hand out with a small jar of baby food and a miniature spoon with an ornate infinity symbol carved in the handle. She handed the spoon and the jar to the Doctor and he kissed her briefly in thanks.

"Are you shagging my daughter?" Jackie asked him at last.

All the conversations went silent.

"At the moment?" he said distractedly, still trying to coax Starr into eating, what was in the baby food bottle, this time.

"Prat," Jackie answered. "Give her here."

He shrugged and passed the baby over the table. Starr giggled happily. Rose beamed at her proudly. She would never be afraid of anyone, it seemed. If they could just maintain this aspect of her personality as she grew up...

Rose's eyes blurred as it hit her all at once. Oh, _gods_, it hurt.

The Doctor wrapped his arm around her shoulder and tugged her into a hug against his jacket. "I know," he whispered. "I'm sorry. I know."

* * *

Still, Starr stayed with them. They bounced from world to world, avoiding places the Doctor knew for sure they would have trouble and, though they never talked about it, places where they could find a family who could take her. They got in trouble from time to time, and they rescued each other and still managed to keep the baby safe.

She learned to say "Da da" one clear morning while they were running for their lives with Starr strapped in a clever little carrier across Rose's back. The Doctor let them into the TARDIS with Starr still proudly calling him "Da" and he sent Rose to put her to bed.

When Rose found him a few hours later, his face was wet and his blue eyes looked almost as shattered as they had after the encounter with the lone Dalek. "We can't keep her," he whispered. Rose held him tightly and listened to the heavy rant of his absolute silence.

* * *

The morning he came in from playing at repairing the TARDIS to find Rose singing a soft lullaby to the quietly sobbing little girl very nearly broke him. Her dark eyes smiled so gently and the tears stilled in Starr's as she watched him walk toward them. "Why can't we keep her?" Rose's eyes asked him, though she never said a word, just sang her lilting tune and held the little girl close.

"I don't know," he didn't answer, just sat gingerly on the arm of the recliner and held onto his little family for dear life. After a moment, his voice blended with Rose's, rising and shifting in perfect harmony, and the song was all that kept them both from falling completely to pieces.

* * *

Starr learned to walk in the TARDIS, leaning on Rose or the handy rails the sentient ship supplied, taking tiny, wobbly steps to reach the Doctor and cling to his leather jacket. Then she would bounce off of him and toddle slowly back to Rose, falling down and shrieking with hilarity every time her little bottom hit the floor.

The Doctor kept his telepathic communion with her almost constant after that, just to make sure she didn't try to wander off, or do too much and hurt herself. He had rarely been happier in his life than he was on nights when he and Rose lay in his bed, with Starr, exhausted from her efforts of the day, sleeping contentedly between them.

He spoke to Rose about his past while they lay there in the dark on those nights. Sometimes she cried. Once or twice, he did. Her mind and his grew entwined, the link forged in the heartache of fear and completed in the burning of the Vortex becoming something stronger, something precious, something unbreakable. He admitted that he'd always wanted this with her, but been afraid to commit to it, been afraid to ask it of her.

The necessity of providing telepathic communion for Starr made him braver, and the knowledge that he would have to give Starr up made the connection to Rose an imperative that he couldn't ignore. The unsolemnitized nature of their union became a forgotten triviality. They were together, she was his, he was hers, they just were. Her Doctor and his Rose, and their Star Child.

* * *

The day they met Sarah Jane Smith was particularly hard because, of all the people Rose had imagined who had travelled with the Doctor before, Sarah's still beautiful face would never have been one she pictured. They had left Starr with Jackie intermittently, but had her with them the day it all came crashing down.

Sarah Jane offered to keep her. Rose was tempted by that, but another idea was forming in her head as she watched the Doctor thank his friend and apologize for oh, so many things. He offered to take her home and she accepted, then laughingly dove into the TARDIS corridors, dragging Mickey along for company, claiming that she wanted to see if anything she remembered was still there. Rose was grateful for the time; she and Sarah Jane had exchanged a silent, wordless conversation on that point.

"Doctor," she said, as they prepared to take the TARDIS back to Croydon (he was sure he could hit Croydon, this time).

"What is it?" he asked, easily reading her nervousness and the worry that she was going to say the wrong thing.

"I could stay."

"What?" he demanded.

"No, seriously, hear me out." She sighed and put Starr down in the little play area the TARDIS had designed for her to keep her out of trouble in the console room. "I could get a place for me and Starr. I'd have my mum and Sarah Jane and... and you could keep her, that way. Wouldn't have to worry about her, so much. Jack'd give me a job, I'm sure, so I could afford it, maybe doing his filing and stuff, not actually hunting aliens. I could keep her and... and you'd have a home to come to, with us."

He looked thunderstruck, alarmed, appalled, elated all at once. His mind was a jangling cacophony inside her head, so much that she couldn't make out what his reaction was. "I don't want to leave you," she said. "I want to stay with you. But... you want her to be with us, and it isn't safe, we know that now, but..."

He stopped her, both hands on her shoulders. "You'd do that?" he asked. "For me?"

"Wouldn't be so bad, would it?" she ventured. "I'd still be with you - it'd be like, you know, nine to five saving the world, then home for supper."

He snatched her close and held her tight, his arms shaking as she buried her face in the leather of his jacket and forced herself not to cry. It was a terrible choice, but she'd do it, do it every day, just to be sure he could have a real life, and still do what he was supposed to do.

"I love you," he whispered into her hair, so softly she couldn't even be sure he said it aloud.

"Well, yeah," she agreed, only just this second realizing that he'd never actually said it before. "I love you."

* * *

It had to happen eventually, but it came as a complete shock to both of them when it did. They were on New Earth again, having taken Mickey for a visit with the Face of Boe, when the Doctor stopped suddenly in mid-description and looked around in horror.

They were sitting out of the lawn above the City, the apple grass smelling like heaven on New Earth. Boe in his tank and his friend Hame the Cat were talking to Mickey a few feet away. Starr was toddling around, still too tiny to rely on her chubby little legs for much of anything, but the grass was clean and Rose was quick enough to keep her from putting anything into her mouth.

"It's time," the Doctor whispered.

He was shaking. Rose stared at him, appalled. "You mean..." she couldn't say it, she really couldn't.

The Face of Boe seemed to have known. He looked up in sympathy and "spoke" kindly, apologetically. _"We will care for her, until the time is right,"_ he said silently.

The time lines had coalesced. The Doctor tried to shuffle through them, searching desperately for one, any one, that didn't have to end this way. The only ones he could reach that didn't end with losing her like this ended in death and destruction instead. He couldn't bear it.

He darted across the lawn and snatched Starr up, holding her close, whispering things he never thought he would say aloud again to anyone. Rose appeared at his side, looking weak and pale, and as shaky as he felt. He dragged her into the embrace as well, and they were leaning on each other, clinging, fighting tears. Starr, for the first time either of them could remember, burst into absolutely inconsolable tears and sobbed in uncomprehending anguish.

She had cried before, of course, all babies did, but it was never like this. She wouldn't still, wouldn't stop, wouldn't be comforted. "Da," she protested.

"I know," the Doctor whispered. "Oh, I'm sorry."

"We love you," Rose insisted. "We'll always love you."

"Mama!!" she shrieked as Hame came to take her from them.

Rose broke. "You never called me that," she whispered through tears. "Oh, I love you. I'll miss you, we'll never forget you, not ever."

_"She will never forget you, either,"_ the Face of Boe promised.

The Cat nurse took the little girl from the Doctor's trembling hands. He stopped her briefly, laid a tender kiss on the baby's forehead. "My little one," he whispered. Then, he laid a hand on her brow, pronounced a soft, chiming benediction. "Sleep, Star Child," he said, at last.

Their little girl closed her vivid blue eyes. The Doctor almost managed a smile as he stroked her golden hair one last time. "I love you," he whispered into the sudden silence. A single tear made its solitary way down his suddenly old and weary face.

Hame stepped close to the tank and, with a flash of blue, she and the Face of Boe and the Star Child were gone. Mickey stood silently and shook his head, before wandering back to the TARDIS, leaving the couple to comfort one another.

Even the wind didn't dare blow to interrupt their grief.

* * *

The planet of Rakku was awash in a celebration of peace. The Star Child had returned at long last and the days of war were over. The people were happily beating their swords into plowshares, and their young leader looked down on the giddy chaos below, smiling a wistful, far away smile.

The return of the Star Child had been prophesied since the War broke out. Her parents had supposedly been the last two legitimate leaders of the two separate sects.

Starr didn't know that. All she knew was that peace was the way things were meant to be. Her father, her real father, would be proud. She could hardly remember him, or her mother, but Boe had promised her that her memories were true. Her mother was a golden haired flower of a girl, her father a wounded, reluctant soldier with star-fire eyes.

He would be proud, because she would heal a world, a whole world, and without firing a single shot. He was, after all, a Doctor, with all the healing that entailed. Starr was his daughter and, though she could barely remember him, she would do what he would do: save this world, and make it better.

She fingered the infinity medallion around her neck and watched the parties below her with laughter in her eyes. As she made her way to bed for the night, she hoped they had bananas, as they'd need them.

Time sang itself into the way things were meant to be around her, and the Star Child slept, dreaming of blue boxes and her mother's dark eyes, and her father's giddy, shining smile.


End file.
